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Published: January 30th 2012
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Looking for white beaches, perfect clear blue water, hot sun and mass amounts of rum punch? Welcome to Caye Caulker!
Our tour group made the long 9hr trek (including a bus ride, 2 boat rides and 2 lots of border control) from Playa to the beautiful island of Caye Caulker off the Belizean coast and it was totally worth it.
The island is tiny - there are no cars, only golf carts; no paved roads, only sand; and not much to do other than lay in a hammock on the beach with a panty ripper in hand (rum and pineapple).
Our first day in we headed out into the coastal waters for a full day snorkelling tour organised through a group called Ragamuffin. As a large group of 16, we had a sailboat to ourselves and we quickly re-distributed ourselves into prime tanning positions. Despite copious amounts of sunscreen, I still managed to get sunburnt and acquire a sexy-looking sunglasses tan. YAY me!
First stop was the reef, which we were well-warned about not to touch as that is all it takes to kill it. I haven't snorkelled on a reef in years so it was awesome to swim around
and marvel at such an amazing feat of nature.
Once we climbed back on the boat, lunch of rice, pasta salad and chicken was awaiting us which we devoured on the way to our next checkpoint.
This was the best stop - snorkelling with nurse sharks and stingrays. I was literally the first one in the water and have to say its one of the best experiences of my life. The guides jump in to and grabs the sharks and rays so you can touch them which is incredible and I took every chance I got to give them a pat.
Eventually, they pulled us out and took us off to the next marine reserve for a little snorkelling tour and the chance to see sea turtles. We swam around for a while spotting moray eels and a variety of other fish but nothing can compare to when we finally stumbled over a big sea turtle munching on some sea grass. It is so exciting to see one in its natural habitat and it wasn't concerned about us at all, just went on with its day, munching grass and swimming up for air. It was the perfect end to the
day and I couldn't recommend the experience more to anyone who is thinking of doing it.
We spent the next day wandering around the town, browsing the many jewellery/gift stands and battling the intense heat. A few of the group went fishing and one girl Georgia managed to catch a monster barracuda so we took that up to one of the restaurants and they cooked it up for us on their big grill - it was delicious. We followed that up with drinks and karaoke.... my first time! I got up and performed a spot-on rendition with another girl of "Make You Sweat" by Inner Circle and "I Want to Break Free" by Queen. Lots of fun so it was quite a good night.
Incensed by the fishing success by Georgia, Liam and Jarrod (who had managed to catch basically nothing) signed up for another fishing trip and I decided to go along too. There was a lot of joking about how as the only girl I was probably going to catch the only fish, and lo and behold, first catch of the day goes to me! I managed to reel in a nice barracuda around 60cm, much to
the boys disgust, and they attacked the waters with renewed ferocity. Luck held out for them and they both managed to catch a barracuda each, both bigger than mine. Jarrod's fish ending up snapping the rod in half and the driver had to come help him reel it in - it was quite funny to watch a tandem reel in. After that, luck decided to ditch us and the other things we caught was reef and a seagull (much to my horror it ate my bait then got tangled up in the line but we got it out and it flew off a-ok). By the time we had lost every single last one of our drivers hooks, it was time to call it a day. We turned around and headed back in to cook one of the barra for lunch.
After that, it was time to leave our lovely island and drive all the way across the country to San Ignacio. We arrived at our destination to find that we were staying in an "eco-lodge". Basically, it's drop toilets, concrete outdoor showers and lots of bug netting. I actually didn't mind the place too much but Christine was horrified
and spent a good 15minutes spraying our cabin til the fumes forced us out the door. A big worry for most people was tarantulas, as they are quite common in the area. Now, anyone who knows me at all knows I hate spiders, but when I was chatting to the lodge owner and he mentioned he could show us one, I jumped at the chance and pulled Chrissy along with me. This spider lived in a crack under the paving of his house, and he called it his pet. Let me tell you, they are fat ugly scary looking things but after seeing it, they didn't worry me at all after that. They just hang out in their hidey hole and only come out for prey. He even played with it, twitching a piece of grass in front of it so that it reacted to the vibrations (they are quite blind) and jumped out onto the grass. I thought it was really cool to see and I'm glad I did, it just goes to show you can change your perceptions when you try.
We only had one day in San Ignacio and as it is known for its caves,
that was thing to do. We had a choice of 2 different caves or tubing through caves down a river. 5 of us signed up for the tubing as the idea of crawling through small tunnels didn't appeal and we headed off with our guide. After a quick lunch, we walked a couple of k's up to the start point where he equipped us with a hard hat with a headlight so we could see once inside. We literally jumped on our tubes and floated into a pitch black opening. The current was quite slow so it was very relaxing and our guide explained different formations to us and pointed out interesting bits and pieces. About halfway through the second cave, he pulled us over to a small waterfall which we climbed up and took us on a little journey through the cave. He showed us this stunning area with its own little pool and a sheet of hanging rock where locals often come to get married. Then we climbed a rock and dove into a beautiful clear blue pool from about 6ft high, which we enjoyed so much we did it twice.
It was a really nice relaxing day
and when the others came back filthy and exhausted, we were quite pleased with our choice.
Unfortunately, that was our last day in Belize which was disappointing as we really enjoyed our time there, but most people were pleased to leave Trek Stop (the eco-lodge) so we left mid-morning to make our way in to Guatemala and the famous ruins of Tikal.
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cabochick
Andrea
ah ha love the title!
I'm going to follow you only because you remind me of my younger self - running all around mexico and central america, scooter mishaps, general debauchery. Keep up the good work.